Sport coaching group activities for focus, team unity, & ability to predict actions ahead of time

Sport coaching for team sports often emphasizes the physical
mechanics. But there’s something else that can greatly improve a team’s
skills. A perfect example of team unity in nature might be those flocks
of birds that whirl through the air, then suddenly all shift in a new
direction at the same time as though they can predict what needs to
happen.

Imagine the chaos if they didn’t have access to that ability?

Imagine if your sports team did?

When
I coached girls’ softball, I saw this ability in the kids develop over
time. They started knowing ahead of time what would be pitched or if a
throw would be off, so they could adjust in time.

Group activities for sport coaching to achieve focus, pre-awareness of others’ actions and better team unity

You'll play various body language guessing games with your team. By
engaging in these group activities often enough, athletes get
re-introduced to their ability to observe “what’s going to happen before
it happens” enough times to reawaken and strengthen this ability.

Here
are some examples, but when you get the hang of it, you’ll no doubt
make up your own. I’ve used softball as the example sport, but adapt it
to hockey, volley ball, basketball… whatever team sport improvement
you’re working on. (They’ll learn to observe regardless of the sport you
emphasize, but it has more meaning by emphasizing your team's sport for
these group activities.)

Sport coaching example 1: Gather the team to sit as a group
audience while one volunteer teammate is the actor. Set up three targets
at least 20 feet apart that the volunteer player can throw a softball
towards (or kick a soccer ball, serve a volley ball, shoot a basketball
towards…). Put three softballs (pucks, baseballs, footballs…) near the
volunteer. Whisper to her which targets she’ll throw (kick, hit…) the
ball towards. For example, “target one, then target three, then back to
target one.” Say, “Go!” The volunteer begins throwing the ball, while
the team shouts out as soon as they think they know which target she’ll
throw towards. If she forgets the order of targets to throw towards and
throws in the wrong order, that’s okay. The point is just for her to
throw somewhere and let the others guess which target she’s throwing to
before it happens.

Sport coaching example 2: Same
as above, only have just one target. For basketball and hockey, the
target would simply be a basketball hoop or the hockey goal. This time
the volunteer will either purposely throw the ball directly towards the
target, purposely to the left, or purposely to the right. The rest of
the team calls out, “left!” “center!” or, “right!” as soon as they think
they know what will happen. Realize the volunteer may mean to hit the
center and go left accidentally. That’s fine for this game, and can even
make it more valuable for the other teammates. His weakness on his
target ability shouldn’t be made an issue of during this observing
practice. After the game, you can privately give him some target
practices he can work on individually.

Sport coaching example 3: The volunteer for this game needs good control of her skills, so it may
need to be the coach or an older more skilled volunteer who’s not on
the team. Choose three different offensive actions that could take place
during a game. For example, in baseball or softball, the player could
hit a grounder, a pop up, or a line drive. In football, the quarter back
could throw to the left, fake to the right, or run with the ball.
Gather the team as above, and have the group call out what they think the
move will be each time the word, “Go!” is shouted by the coach.

Here are the main benefits of these sport coaching activities

-
Kids learn to flow better with their teammates at sometimes lightening
speed… even predicting a missed catch or an off-target throw before it
reaches them, so they can adjust to it.

- Just by learning to read
body language in their teammates, they’ll automatically get keener at
predicting their opponents’ moves… change ups, fakes, bunts, and so on.

-
It also strengthens mental focus in sports skills in general, helping
individual players catch more footballs, spike more volleyballs and hit
more pitched baseballs without distraction or second-guessing. One of
the joys of coaching sports for kids especially is that as they develop
sports skills, they develop valuable lifetime skills as well.